


What Will Become History

by meanoldauthor



Series: Mean Old Lady [12]
Category: Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Gen, Post-Game(s), Retrospective
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-31
Updated: 2016-05-31
Packaged: 2018-07-11 09:55:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7043386
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meanoldauthor/pseuds/meanoldauthor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It doesn't matter so much what happened, but the lessons that it taught.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What Will Become History

“You even move since I was here last?”

Ulysses watched her sit on the rocks beside him. “Have better things to do than wait for you, courier.”

Adal wiggled on the spot, trying to get comfortable. “Sure. Tunnelers behaving themselves? Marked men?”

“That I’ve seen.” He was looking her over, silently taking in her appearance. She looked out over the Divide rather than stare back, the yellowish sky the brightest it ever seemed to get. She slid over a little, trying to find a position that didn’t dig sharp bits of rock into her rear. “Divide armor,” he said. “Wore that at the Dam?”

“Yep.” Fucking _hell_ , she’d sat up here before without being this uncomfortable…

“Fitting,” he said, and Adal raised an eyebrow. “Carrying the Divide with you, after what happened here, taking its strength to drive out the Bear and Bull.” She grumbled and stood, and Ulysses caught the edge of her duster, poking his fingers through a tear at the hem. “And the symbol on your back as well… though would have hoped more care would be taken.”

She tugged it loose. “Oh, don’t get all indignant, that is an honorable battle scar. ‘F you didn’t expect me to wear it into a fight, you shouldn’t’ve given it to me.” She stumped over to a fallen log along the path. “And how’d you know about the battle?”

“Travelers,” he said, turning to follow her. “Try to cross through the Divide, or loot its carcass. Turn them away, for their safety, its dignity.” He watched her break off the dry, brittle branches and peel up hunks of the wood. “Courier. What are you…?”

“Look,” she said, picking a flat bit of rock and arranging the twigs. “I have had a long-ass few weeks, mopping up Legion raiding parties and, y’know,” she waved a hand as though at something massive, “keeping my city from imploding. I am going to fucking murder the next person who asks me about trade routes or currency or those damn robots.” She ran a hand through her hair. “I need a freaking break. May be morbid, but this is the only damn spot I can think of no one followin’ me.” A bit of scrub struggling to grow between the rocks made for tinder, catching the spark from her lighter. “You want some gecko? I got some gecko that needs eating.”

“Courier.” She ignored the tone in his voice, blowing on the fire. “Said already this was no camp.”

“No, you said you didn’t want to claim it as one, since the Divide wasn’t yours,” she said, feeding larger hunks of wood on. “So you gonna tell _me_ to fuck off?”

A moment of silence. The fire hit a comfortable height, and she rummaged in her bag. She had some peppers, she was sure, some banana yucca… And there, gecko meat that didn’t smell off yet, a couple long sticks…

“Divide’s yours to do with as you wish,” he said, as though washing his hands of it.

“Betcher ass.” Adal propped the skewers over the flames, and she sat back against the rock wall. He was still sitting on the ledge, back to her. “Y’know, it’s gonna be really awkward to talk to you from here,” she said, raising her voice slightly.

Ulysses looked over his shoulder, irritation writ above his mask. “So move.”

She pointed to the fire. “Not letting these burn.”

“Then don’t _speak_.”

“Alright,” she said, raising her hands. He faced the Divide again. Adal drummed her fingers on her legs, then lifted herself up to sweep a few pebbles out from under her. The ledge was silent but for the soft wind, and she found herself whistling under her breath as she leaned forwards to turn the kebabs. It was nice, almost, and she shut her eyes for a moment, taking a deep breath. Peaceful, without having to close herself up in the mausoleum that was the 38. She drew up short as she reached to turn the kebabs again, stopping to arch her back and dig her thumbs into it until her spine gave a loud pop. She sighed and sat back, slouching comfortably.

She looked up. Ulysses had twisted around to watch her, distinctly annoyed. She held up a skewer. “Want some? I made extra.”

He shook his head and faced away. “Some people might call that rude,” she said, pulling the others off the heat. The smell made her mouth water. “Turnin’ down a hot meal. What is there to eat out here, anyway? S’pose there’s Tunneler, if you’re desperate…” He flashed a quick look of disgust at her, drawing breath to speak. “Wait, don’t tell me you live on those MRE things.”

“They’re adequate,” he said.

Adal snorted. “Oh, hell, come on. Even if you aren’t sick of them by now, they’re two centuries old. They’ll make your teeth fall out, or something.” She waved a kebab. “C’mon. Won’t stay hot forever.” She took a bite of one. “Mmm. ‘ey turn’d out, ‘oo.”

He was watching her still, exasperated. She swallowed and held out a fresh one. “Not poisoned, or anything,” she said.

Ulysses closed his eyes a moment—why am I doing this, she could almost hear him think—then stood to join her. He pulled his breathing mask down as he sat, taking it.

Adal tried not to watch him, glancing away whenever she thought he might look. She hadn’t seen him without his mask before, and it had either left a mark on his face or that frown was permanent. It suited him. She’d come by a couple times before the battle at the Dam, picking his brains for anything useful on the Legion or its Legate. They had been dour conversations with a dour man, trying to wring as much information out as she could while dancing around volatile topics.

She realized she was staring, and he was looking back, frowning a little deeper. She shrugged and went back to her food. It wasn’t until she had tossed the stick on the fire and wiped her fingers on her pant leg that he spoke. “Lanius.”

“Huh?” Adal poked at the fire with the other skewer. “What about him?”

“You faced him, at the Dam,” Ulysses said. He had left the mask resting on his chest, leaving his voice a little clearer. “A meeting that legends will be made of… Yet I think few who witnessed it survived.” He tipped his head, curious. “Would hear the telling, the truth of it. What will become history.”

“You know more’n anyone my version’s worthless,” she said. “People are gonna make up their own ways it happened, better ones, even if they don’t mean to tell it wrong. Hell, _I_ might not even remember it right, things were goin’ pretty crazy right then.”

“No reason for you to lie. Not here,” he said, indicating the Divide with a slight wave. “And if memory fails, I must be content with the fact. Yours will still be the truest telling.”

“That’s as may be.” She rolled the other stick between her palms, and shrugged. “Wish I could say I walked up and beat him down without a thought. Or even it turned out he was a dumb thug, and I mocked him into running,” she said. The battle at the Dam had been chaos, and she stared out over the Divide, trying to bring it to order in her mind. “You want truth? I was sore, shot up, tired. I was shaking, walking up to his camp. Stone-ass sober and wishin’ I wasn’t.” She rubbed at the charred tip of the stick, not looking at him. “Ran out of ammo halfway along, no choice but to use the sledge. Took care of the guards and pulled down the doors, me and what backup survived that long. And there he fucking was.”

Adal broke the stick in half, and half again. “You never knew Lanius.”

“After my time.”

She threw the fragments away. “’Monster of the East.’ Thought he was a statue or somethin’ at first, all in metal and big as two of me. Then he spoke, called off his people, so I did the same. Said… god, can’t remember exactly. You know how it is, in a moment, where it all just… _happens?_ Where the world goes real clear, and you’re just running as the ground goes out from under you, and hoping like hell you get to the other side?”

“I do,” he said, voice low. She glanced over. He was watching her, intense in a way that made her neck prickle.

“Well, it was like that. I’d been thinking about what you said, about scaring him with failure, talking of Graham,” she said. She had run out of things to fidget with, and rolled the hem of her duster between her fingers. She laughed a little, humorless. “But fuck all if I could turn it into an argument, right then. All I could really think of was a bit of my own history: angry people are really stupid. Wasn’t all that well-spoken. I just threw it in his face, that he was thinkin’ too small for the stakes at hand, didn’t stand a chance if even the last Legate, twice the man he was, had lost there.”

He was watching her closely still, weighing her words, but didn’t interrupt. “Riled him right up,” Adal said. “Wanted me dead, about then… worse. So I told him, do it right. I die, better be at his hand, not by a dog or some flunky with a power fist, if he wanted glory. Honor.” She blew out a long breath. “Hell. Barely remember the fight. No one touched us, I know that. Wound up breaking his legs just to get leverage, remember hearing an arm go… and I’m cut up and bruised and all but sweatin’ blood, and he’s still coming at me.

“I’m not a prayin’ kind of woman, but hell… Wished I’d never punched that Canaanite all those years ago. Then…” She gave a quick, dry laugh. “He was probably every bit as sweaty and gross s’I was. Took a swing for his head and barely hit him, but his stupid mask slips, and he can’t see. I pounded the shit out of him for it.” She shook her head. “Crazy. Just fuckin’ crazy, but I walk away and he doesn’t. Not poetic, or pretty. Got the job done, is all, even if it’s dirty way to win a fight.”

“Wonder if irony meant anything to him,” Ulysses said, sitting back.

“Thought you’d appreciate that,” she said. She tipped her head, watching him. “You ain’t exactly cheering, over there.”

A pause, a moment she could almost feel him finding just the right words. “Lanius stood for the worst in the Legion,” he said, looking at the fading fire. “Its strength, its short-sightedness… how it would destroy itself, were the Bull allowed to travel West unchecked. Under Caesar, it offered some sort of order, yet even then…” He looked up at her, and bowed his head very slightly. “A favor to the world, seeing them dead.”

“’S what I thought,” she said. “Now it’s just me, trying to hold it all together. Ah, don’t give me that look, you wouldn’t’ve let me walk out of this place if you didn’t think I could do it.”

A flash of irritation, and another of those conceding nods. “What of Outer Vegas?”

“Ugh. That’s a long-ass story,” she said, sitting back. He was still watching, waiting. She raised an eyebrow. “Don’t tell me you’re up to hear it?”

“Let you walk on the chance you would set things right.”

“Chance? Like you take chances,” she said, crossing a leg over the other. “You wanna hear it, I’ll fuckin' tell you. Finally got word the Fiends are broken for good…”

She talked until the fire nearly burned out, voice going dry. He listened, and spoke back at length, the sky growing dark.

Simply talking, Adal could almost forget the hardships she had faced in the Divide below, at his call. Could imagine he hadn’t wanted her to suffer.

And in the dark, in the lonely night, it was enough.


End file.
